Chapter One
Fur and Fangs.
Livie flipped a page of the magazine.
Fangs and fur.
She flipped another page. She didn’t get it. At all.
She’d reunited with her sister Sela less than a month ago, and already she worried that she needed to have her committed.
Cheeze-its.
What the hell was Sela thinking? Hooking up with a—she could not stifle the wince—werewolf?
Cheeze-its and crackers.
A month ago Livie would have howled—argh, wrong word—she would have shouted with laughter if someone told her that werewolves existed. She would have smiled politely, and left the immediate vicinity. And the surrounding fifty miles just to be on the safe side.
Or better yet, she would have pulled out her gorgeous, I-have-a-point-to-make Glock, and made the lunatic leave the area. On a plane. Headed towards Greenland.
And now here she was, not only knowing that werewolves did in fact exist, but living under one’s roof.
Cheeze-its, crackers and the damn plate as well.
It gave her the willies. After almost three weeks, she still slept with a knife under her pillow, and kept the door locked on it all.
On them.
The comes-with-skin-or-fur men.
And fangs.
She certainly couldn’t forget the fang part. Mac had actually bitten her sister Sela with his fangs. And Sela claimed she liked it.
Livie slammed the magazine down on the bed. There must be something in the water. The curtains fluttered as a brisk wind blew in through the open window. She glared at the offending opening. Or maybe there was something in the air around here.
Who would have guessed that even if werewolves did exist, they would live in a narrow valley in Southeastern Idaho? Wasn’t Idaho one of those states where the men not only felt they had the right to bear arms, but they armed their bears as well?
Living in a state with a highly active hunting population did not seem like a great place for men who liked to go furry upon occasion to take up residence.
But who knew?
These guys were beasts in the truest sense of the word. Who knew what they thought?
The curtains flapped sharply against the window pane and the pages of her magazine fluttered and rustled as a powerful gust of wind entered the room.
She sat up, grimacing as the new skin along her side pulled at the movement. Her wound was healing nicely, but she still had the occasional sharp twinge if she moved too quickly.
Getting shot sucked.
Livie swung her legs around and stood up slowly. If she stood too fast she had an unfortunate tendency to pass out. The doctor told her that in addition to being undernourished she was anemic as well. Then to top it off, the idiot told her sister Sela too.
Livie hadn’t been able to get out of this bedroom after that. After years of separation and living on the run, she’d finally been able to reunite with at least one of her sisters, who turned out to be the biggest mother hen in the entire state. Possibly the country.
She wanted to simply treasure this time with Sela. She didn’t know how long it would last. The Order of the Elements would be hot on their trail soon. Or perhaps just hers. Sela had moved into Mac’s home.
The Order knew all about the latent Elemental power the sisters held within their bodies. Well, latent for Livie and Rea at any rate. Sela’s power over water was active. The Order wanted to control their power. The sisters wanted to live normal lives.
Rolling her eyes, Livie stood slowly and walked gingerly towards the window. How did a girl have a normal life when she controlled one of the Elements? She didn’t know which Element – wind, fire or earth. Sela’s power had been sparked last month and she’d discovered that she controlled the Element of water. And frankly, Livie didn’t care to find out which Element she controlled. She devoutly hoped her power never sparked. She didn’t want it.
At all.
She gripped the sill and tugged the window closed. She hated the wind. Its dismal howling taunted her, reminding her of her loneliness.
She turned her head. What was that? She strained to hear it again. It sounded like drums, but not quite as booming, more like two chairs slamming together. She flushed. Or a bed hitting a wall.
Mac and Sela were at it again.
She tried desperately to tune out the sound. Sheesh, bunnies had nothing on werewolves. This had to be the third time today if she counted right.
Not that she intentionally counted out the number of times her sister had sex. The pounding grew louder. But it was awfully hard to ignore it when the evidence pounded on the wall right next to her.
Livie jerked her head up. They’d be at it a while. She could escape her bedroom without going through mother hen Sela. She clapped her hands like a child then froze. She laughed at herself, like those two were going to hear a little clap over all of that noise.
She quickly gathered up several of the magazines on the bedside table, swiped her knife from under her pillow, eyed her Glock, but decided the elastic in her yoga pants wouldn’t support its weight, and almost ran to the door. She opened it, checked the hall, just to be on the safe side, then sprinted to the stairs.
She skidded on the wood floor at the bottom and had to grab onto the railing to keep from landing in a tumbled pile. As soon as she regained her balance, she let go and pressed her hand to her side.
Cheeze-its, that hurt. She could have walked down the hall and the stairs, and spared herself the pain because she knew it would be nearly an hour, an hour for heaven’s sake, before Sela and Mac would emerge, but the thought of freedom beckoned.
Livie bent over and groaned. Next time freedom could knock first then politely ask.
Straightening slowly, she kept her hand pressed to her side until the pain eased. She waited. Okay, good to go.
She looked around. Hmm, where to go? It appeared she had several options. She knew the hall led to the kitchen. Livie pondered several other doors. She glanced down the hall again. Yep, sum total of her knowledge.
Seriously, taking a bullet in the side really sucked. Although the bullet couldn’t be blamed for her total lack of knowledge, after Sela had caught up with her in New Orleans and convinced her to come to Idaho, they had spent all of their time closeted away in the bedroom Mac had lent her, catching up. Her sister Sela didn’t mind and Livie didn’t want to admit that the possibility of running into one of the werewolves simply skeeved her out.
Then she’d been shot. She’d been in this house for almost three weeks and she didn’t know anything about it except the location of her bedroom, bathroom and the kitchen.
Livie clenched her fists. Damn those bastards. The only thing worse than actually getting shot had been getting shot by the Order. Nothing worse than allowing your enemy to gain the advantage, however briefly.
She hated not knowing her way around. Her number one rule: know your way around you and every possible escape route. She liked that rule. It had saved her bacon more times than she could remember. Some might actually consider it more of an obsession with her than a rule. Livie didn’t care. As long as she survived and avoided capture by the Order.
Not knowing the layout of Mac’s home made her feel . . . helpless.
Like a little girl starved for affection from a drunken mother, huddled together with her sisters, uncertain if they were going to leave in a rush or be caught or even if there was any food in the damn house.
Livie took a deep breath. Calm, you can do it. Take another breath. Remembering never helped.
Her stomach rumbled.
She huffed. She’d do calm another ti
me, right now she was famished. A typical state for her, but these days she could actually do something about it. She had a ready source of food on hand for the first time in as long as she could remember. Even if it did come from a werewolf.
She turned down the hall practically rubbing her hands in glee. She would start in the kitchen and then check out the other rooms.
****
Roc took the corner too fast, spun the wheel and corrected the truck.
Damn it all to hell.
He clenched his fist, but resisted the temptation to pound into the dash. He’d just bought this truck. He didn’t want to damage it. But, fuck it all, he was pissed.
He’d almost had them. He knew it. He had been so close. Another week or two and he would have been on them. He’d tried explaining that to Cam, but his Wolven wanted him to come home. And when the Wolven, the King, gave an order, you didn’t argue.
Hell.
He slammed his fist into the dash. Fuck. And now he had a large fist-sized indention in the dash of his new truck. Great, just great, that just topped off his last few weeks.
He’d been chasing his tail trying to find this Order of the Elements. These guys had a slick set up. He’d been on them in New Orleans and trailed them to his clan’s town in Idaho, but lost them almost immediately after the fight. And Sela’s enormous display of Elemental power.
He shook off those memories. He didn’t want to remember why he’d lost them after the fight in his town. It still made his stomach twist.
And now he was on the road back to his town and back to another problem he didn’t want to face. Mac and Sela.
Roc bared his teeth. He was happy for Mac, truly he was. But it felt like a fist to the gut every time he saw his best friend Mac and Mac’s mate Sela. The two of them damn near glowed with happiness. Roc wanted that. He wanted that connection, that sense of belonging, that knowledge that he wasn’t alone anymore. He was so damn tired of being alone.
At least while he had been on the road and chasing after the bad guys he didn’t have to see Mac and Sela and feel the envy burning a hole in his gut. He didn’t want to be jealous. He and Mac had been best friends since they were pups centuries ago.
On the road he’d had a mission, something to focus on. Find this crazy Order of the Elements chasing after Mac’s mate Sela. And Sela’s sisters.
His knuckles whitened around the steering wheel. He couldn’t forget the sisters part.
His mission gave him a purpose, an important one, as well as a reason to be away. And a chance to get his beast under control. But he hadn’t been gone long enough. His inner beast prowled restlessly, pacing back and forth, nudging the confines of its cage, waiting for a chance to escape.
If he didn’t regain at least some control soon, he wouldn’t be any good to anyone. Certainly not his Wolven. He couldn’t let either Cam or Mac know how close to the edge he clung. He would have to talk Cam into letting him go out again on another hunt.
He rounded another corner and the road stretched out before him. Dust plumed behind his truck as he sped up down the dirt road. Cam wanted them to meet at Mac’s house. Sela’s sister had been injured in the fight and hadn’t fully recovered yet so they were keeping her in Mac’s house until she was strong enough to manage on her own.
The sister. Roc ground his teeth. He would not think of her.
Maybe he could convince Cam to let him track down the other sister. The women were triplets, each with the power of one of the Elements, although Sela’s power over water was the only one active. Sela had located one sister, but the other one still remained on the run and hiding out from the damn Order of the Elements. Since they had recently found out that his clan had been the protectors of the Elements centuries ago, he could use that angle to convince Cam to let him track her. Cam took his job as Wolven very seriously.
And he wouldn’t have to see Mac and Sela every day. He wouldn’t have to see his friend mated. If he could manage a little more time alone then maybe, just maybe, he could get his beast under control.
He hit the junction in the road and turned right. Another five miles and he’d be at Mac’s house. Roc ran his tongue over his teeth. His fangs protruded slightly. He rolled his shoulders, feeling the stretch of muscles too dense and powerful to belong to a human.
Fuck.
He had to rein it in. If Cam knew how little control he had right now, he would never allow him to go hunting. The clan couldn’t chance any risk of exposure, any possibility of allowing the humans to discover their secret.
Plus he would be meeting Sela’s sister for the first time. He could not allow his beast to hold sway when they were officially introduced.
Mac and Cam had both warned him that she still appeared nervous around them. Roc snorted. He didn’t blame her. Most women were a little cautious around them anyways. Human males didn’t average well over six feet like the men in his clan did, nor did they come with their thick muscles. And when you added to that the ability to turn into a much larger, even more powerful, heavily furred beast – complete with fangs and claws – Roc could certainly understand her caution.
He knew the sisters had a rough upbringing. They didn’t trust easily, maybe that had something to do with her caution. Although, she’d been in Mac’s house now for several weeks following the fight recovering from a gunshot.
She should know by now that none of the men in his clan would ever hurt a woman.
He snapped his fangs together. He didn’t think he would ever hurt a woman, but the sister . . . he punched his dash again. Screw it, another major dent wouldn’t hurt. He sucked in air. He would control his beast.
He growled low, memory returned in a painful flash. Maybe she did have reason to fear this werewolf.
He didn’t know much about her. Not much more than her blood smelled sweet and caused his fangs lengthen and sharpen. Roc shuddered at the memory. He’d been nearly a mile away, prowling the trees, searching for any potential threats, anyone that might have tried to sneak in behind the line of fire when he’d smelled her blood.
The scent nearly dropped him to his knees.
Sweet, with just a hint of copper and so incredibly fresh, as if it contained both a wildness and innocence at the same time, it called to him. He had reached the edge of the clearing when the growls and gunfire of the battle interrupted his charge toward her scent.
Terrified that he might attack her, Roc did something he’d never done before, he’d turned tail and run. His stomach twisted in remembered shame. He’d run for miles before sanity returned and he realized what he had done.
He’d forced himself to go back, stomach nearly heaving at the thought of attacking an innocent human, a female one at that, only to discover the battle over and a group of the bad guys on the run.
He hadn’t given Cam a chance to argue, simply told him he would track them down and left. Damn near three weeks away and he still didn’t have his beast fully under control.
But her injury wouldn’t be fresh anymore. New skin would be forming over that intoxicating blood. He could do this. He wasn’t an animal, despite what he could turn into.
He could maintain his control. He had to.
He’d report his findings to Cam and Mac and then he would leave again. Use the other sister as an excuse. He’d stay away from Mac and his mate, away from the fang inducing sister, away from them all until he could find a way to control himself and his beast.
He’d lived for centuries, a mighty warrior in his clan. He’d fought vampires, rival clans and knights. He’d battled in human form and as a werewolf. He’d changed from man to beast at will.
He decided when he would turn.
He’d maintained his dominance over his beast up to this point. He would find a way to continue to do so, no matter how tempting the little Elemental might be.
Chapter Two
Livie plopped down into one of the large chairs in Mac’s office. The plush cushions molded around her, snuggling her deep into their embrace. Sh
e pulled a soft blanket Sela had bought last week off the back of the chair and smoothed it in around her. She set her knife next to her leg and tucked two of the magazines under the edge of her thigh so they wouldn’t fall. With a sigh of pure delight, she settled back and opened up the magazine with the too skinny model wearing the hot pink slinky dress on the front.
Heaven.
Thump. Thump.
Livie glared at the ceiling. Damn sex-starved werewolves. Heaving a seriously put-upon sigh, she got back up, stomped over to the counter and turned on the radio. She found a hard rock station and cranked up the music then she stomped back over and resumed her lady of leisure pose on the chair.
She didn’t care if her sister Sela discovered her out of bed. She’d been up and exploring for a while, half an hour maybe and already it had taxed her. Enough that her hands shook slightly. She hadn’t even been able to make it outside. Damn it. She was frustrated, restless and almost . . . bored.
Cheeze-its.
She didn’t want to be bored with her own company. She’d been alone for so long, she figured she would always be alone and had accustomed herself to the idea. Sort of. But after only a few weeks of being around her sister, she had adjusted — talking to her, laughing with her, eating with her and even arguing with her sister.
She’d even become somewhat used to Mac and Cam — at least their bodies taking up space in a room.
She would struggle when she left. And she was beginning to think that she would have to leave, despite the BIG reunion. Once they found Rea, and Livie knew she was okay, she would leave. She couldn’t live with the werewolves.
She might have an Elemental power lying dormant inside of her, but she didn’t turn furry and grow fangs and claws. It just freaked her out.
She rattled the magazine in her hands, shaking the papers until the vicious growls and eerie howls from the fight stopped ringing in her ears. The last battle with the Order had left more than physical marks on her body.
Determined to ignore it all for the moment, she concentrated on the article in front of her. “How to give a woman four orgasms.” Oh, please. Where the hell did they come up with this stuff? Four orgasms? During one session of sex?
Fur, Fangs and All (The Elementals Book 2) Page 1